Modern medicine recognises the importance of managing the temperature of patients before, during and after surgical and other medical procedures. Successful patient temperature management can improve patient outcome and reduce patient recovery time.
Patient temperature management can be modelled by considering the heat balance of a patient, that is to say, the rate of gain or loss of heat by the patient. A patient's heat balance may be affected by for example anaesthesia, patient parameters (such as age and gender), environmental conditions (such as ambient temperature and pressure), the proportion of a patient's body which is uncovered, the temperature of fluids introduced into the body and so forth.
A wide range of patient temperature regulation tools are known which can be used to regulate the heat balance of patients undergoing medical/surgical procedures. These include passive insulating tools (e.g. blankets and garments such as gowns, socks or caps) and active warming tools (e.g. forced air warming blankets).
In order to select appropriate tools for regulating the heat balance of patients undergoing a particular medical procedure, the thermal properties of the patient temperature regulation tools may be matched with metrics calculated from anaesthetic parameters, patient parameters and/or specified environmental conditions. However, this may result in the selection of a plurality of tools which are incompatible with each other, or of one or more tools which are incompatible with the particular patient and/or with the particular medical/surgical procedure a patient is to undergo.
Furthermore it is typically necessary to train relevant medical personnel to make them aware of what tools are available, the relevant thermal properties of those tools and how those tools may be used to regulate the heat balance of a patient. However, a wide range of products is available, and new products are regularly developed. It can therefore be difficult for personnel to develop an understanding of the effect of the various patient warming tools which are available and their inter-relationship.
Accordingly, the invention seeks to provide an improved method of and system for selecting appropriate patient temperature regulation tools. Some embodiments of the invention are also useful as training tools which may be used for the training of medical personnel with respect to new and existing patient temperature regulation tools.